Is town hosing woman with big water bill?

Ginny Siciliano says Bethlehem is overcharging her in a bill for metered water and has refused a town offer to settle the dispute.

If Ginny Siciliano had used all the water she’s charged for on her last Bethlehem home water bill, she would have been able to fill six typical in-ground swimming pools between February and May.

She probably could have run her dog-washing business, which is located in rental space in another Delmar building with a separate water bill, for at least a year with that water.

“If I used that much water, I would pay for it, but I don’t even water the lawn,” said Siciliano, who owns a duplex home in Delmar. She lives on one side and her daughter lives on the other with two sons, ages 12 and 14, and a 2-year-old daughter. They share the same water meter.

According to the $962.68 water and sewer bill sent at the end of June, Siciliano used 17,300 cubic feet of water between Feb. 23 and May 29. Converting that with a formula of 7.48 gallons per cubic foot, that’s 129,404 gallons.

According to the town, another 400 cubic feet were used between Feb. 1 and 23. That brings the total reading to 17,700 cubic feet (132,396 gallons) — all on a new water meter installed on Feb. 1.

Siciliano insists there’s simply no way she and her family used all that water. The town also has found no reason for the excessive reading but says there’s also no proof that the meter malfunctioned.

Siciliano’s usage during the same billing period last year ­­– in the same duplex, with the same daughter and three grandchildren ­– was 4,500 cubic feet. That’s less than 40 percent of the amount on this bill.

She acknowledges that she had a running toilet on her side of the duplex in January, before this billing period started, but says she fixed it quickly by replacing the float.

A running toilet can waste more water than people realize ­ — as much as 2 gallons a minute in serious cases, said Crisafulli Plumbing service manager Don Cootware. But it still would have taken an awfully long time to reach the excess usage tallied on Siciliano’s bill.

If there had been a leak or a drip or some other usual explanation, Siciliano says it would have been noticed. She spends a lot of time on her daughter’s side of the duplex watching her granddaughter, and there was no evidence of a leak anywhere inside either house.

Siciliano also figures she knows better than most folks how leaks and other undetected problems can jack up a water bill. She used to own three houses in town, including one with an in-ground pool and two rental properties.

“I’ve had a million runny toilets in my lifetime,” she said.

Bethlehem Water Commissioner Josh Cansler said the town has made reasonable offers to lessen the burden on Siciliano, including writing off a $374 sewer charge, which would bring the bill down to $589, and establishing a payment plan.

“I tried to offer her a pretty significant break, but she didn’t want to listen to it,” he said. “If I cut her bill, other customers are picking up her portion of the bill. If I had proof that the meter wasn’t working it would be a different situation.”

But Cansler also has no proof that there was a leak or other problem to account for Siciliano’s mammoth water usage tally. There have been other cases in which Bethlehem residents saw their water usage spike extraordinarily high, but there’s always been a reason identified, he said.

Sometimes a toilet runs for months or a faucet is left running during a winter trip to Florida. One resident had an undetected leak in his lawn sprinkler system.

“I’m not going to sit here and speculate” about why Siciliano’s bill was so high, Cansler said. “All I know is what went through the meter. “We’ve put 12,000 of these new meters in over the last 10 years, and we’ve never had any evidence of anything going wrong.”

The new meters emit radio waves that permit town employees to check water usage without going inside the house, and Cansler said the town sent Siciliano a notice that her usage appeared higher than usual during a spot check. She said she had no idea that it was more than routine conservation measures would have addressed.

Siciliano said she’s willing to pay for the same amount of water she used during the same period last year, and that seems fair unless some new information comes to light to explain the oddball meter reading. The town should give that option more serious consideration.

If she does decide to give in and take the deal that Cansler offered — a deduction of the sewer charge and a payment plan — both she and the town need to watch that meter like hawks so that everyone can investigate what’s going on at the first sign of strangely excessive use.

25 Responses

this is not a as rare as that town will tell you. I have two homes in delmar, and allowed that town to change meters and once that change took place i owed over a $1000 to the town. I told them that i would not pay and have not paid that fee. On my next house i refused to let the town on the property till they told me they were calling the police. i then got a lawyer and got a hard copy letter letting me me know i would not see additional charges for there meters.

As I understand it this a new meter that the installed february 1, Even though they claim it is working correctly. She should demand they replace it.
I have had meters for the electric company go bad and give a bad reading. Nation Grid checked it and it was bad.

The Bethlehem officials have asserted that any deal would put undue additional burden on other customers. Given this, if they really felt there was no malfunction with the meter, why would they offer a deal?

I really wish this woman well. A similar situation happened to me in the City of Albany, in 2004, and the City refused to acknowledge the anomaly. Good luck, Ginny, and good for you for bringing this to the attention of the newspaper!

There’s a fairly simple solution to this problem. Agree to pay the $589 and pay all of it or a significant portion of it in loose pennies. Completely legal and you’d be surprised how quickly counting a garbage can full of pennies will straighten out a bureaucrat. I might even tell them you enjoy it so much you’re thinking of paying school and property taxes like that too. They will work quickly to make you a happy customer.

This happened to my parents a few years ago, they have lived in Delmar for over 50 years. The town should really look into the new meters and monitor them weekly or at least frequently when they install a new meter to see if there seems to be a change.
The town really needs new leadership.

Sorry Charlie. Although I think most these new short timers in our public works department are full of it, you are SOL. Your 129,000 gallons only translates to about a gallon per minute, which is a trickle from a faucet. You don’t have control over the water use at the property, so the possibility that the tenant used it is easily there. Possibly to stop pipe freezing? I’d respond to you the same way. You should take them up on their offer. At least one other city in the Capital district charges a minimum 6000 gallons quarterly water use and associated sewer charge. Is that fair to those who conserve water and use less, or consistent with water conservation measures?

As far as Cansler is concerned, he stated “We’ve put 12,000 of these new meters in over the last 10 years, and we’ve never had any evidence of anything going wrong.” Who is this “we” he is talking about? How long has he been working for the Town of Bethlehem, 2 years now? The revolving door town hall has been through so many commissioners of public works in the past few years, they will pretend if they don’t have a clue, except how to hire national firms like clough harbour to solve every little thing.

This is similar to what we will see with Smart Grid. They will install sophisticated electronic equipment to measure your utility use. But do you think it will sound a warning if a reasonable maximum is exceeded? No, they’ll just bill the clinton out of you.

I have owned my home in Delmar now for 10 years. I delayed in having the meter replaced until they sent me a letter stating if the meter was not changed, I would be billed for the highest usage in the town. Although I did not think this could be enforced, I had the meter changed. Prior to getting my first Bill with the new meter, I received a letter stating my usage was higher than normal. I called the town and was told the reading was correct and that I was fortunate to have been paying a lower rate for the past 10 years. The lady calculated the bill when I was on the phone an said it would be approximately $220 ($100 more than normal). Sure enough I received a bill for right around $230.
Seems to me that there could be an issue with the new meters. If every house hold is paying more for their water usage, then we have an issue. Even $50 more from every house is a lot of additional revenue.

According to the water dept in Delmar–the town has never had a problem with their radio readers–guess we are blessed that they are never dropped or inaccurate!!

If you think meter is at fault, they will remove it at customer’s expense and send it out to be tested. (meanwhile customer does not have water)
OR they say…….
Someone had a leak they are not confessing or secret guests who used a lot of water or filled up a pool-etc—-

It would be nice if the town was pleasant and was willing to work with people in finding out the cause of the problem but to take the position that the readers are 100% accurate 100% of the time is riduculous. We are all human and mistakes can occur.

Similar thing happened to me 5 years ago when they changed my meter…the bill for the transition period included charges from both the old and new meter. The final “reading” from the old meter taken before they took it away was ridiculous, almost tripling our total recorded usage over the period and doubling our bill (the rate drops after a certain point). That reading indicated we used twice as much water in the first two weeks of the period (old meter) as we did for the whole following 2 1/2 months (new meter). I had to walk the Town’s water person through prior years’ water bills over the same time of the year to convince them the reading was bogus, and they eventually gave me partial credit back.

Good Points #11 and #12. In my opinion, you are right about the revolving door and inexperienced people brought in to town hall; I’m surprised we don’t have Czars yet. It seems like since 2005, the Town wants to do as little as possible for you unless you have inside connections through a PAC, a committee or fire department. When a fire siren sounds off, watch how many people run out of the town hall to respond on our timecard, so much for volunteer fire departments. With 12,000 meters installed and zero defects, I want to buy stock in that company. The town has reportedly “never had any evidence of anything going wrong”. Of course not if they hold this same bullying line every time someone complains. To answer #14, does the Town track complaints about the meters? Can I FOIL a list of all reported high bill complaints or inquiries of meter inaccuracy going back 10 years as Cansler contends? Is their a list of what water or sewer charges have been waived, or is this like Albanys unaccountable parking ticket system? Was a protocol used to test the meter after installation? With all the DPW employees driving town vehicles home every night, one could swing by less than a month after installation and take a quick remote reading for a new meter. If someone’s usage doubles the historic, and they complain, the town should do something more than just wave the sewer charge. How can you trust the meter afterwards? At least give the owner the option to have the meter and installation independently tested and if there is a problem they get the bill waived, if not they split the testing cost and pay the full water and sewer bill. In a case like this, which does not happen very frequently, a Town should not be so lazy but follow a simple procedure.
1. Have the town engineer lay out the “defective meter investigation plan” and when applied, certify that it was followed to prevent any tampering and give it credibility through his license. Why else are we already paying these astronomical town hall salaries as the spotlight uncovered? Include:
2. Have a licensed plumber check that the meter installation doesn’t appear to have been tampered with.
3. Switch out the meter with a new one.
4. Have the meter independently tested.
5. Adjust the bill if appropriate.
6. Track the incident.

These are just a few thoughts, but there should be a more fair solution than denial.

I am wondering if the town checked the entire property for leaks in the water line. My neighbor had a leak in her system and didn’t know it. (Until she got her water bill.) Sure enough, water was spilling out of one of the underground pipes.

Sicilano admits to having “millions of runny toilets” in her lifetime! and coincidentally had one running before this bill but “replaced the float”. Sounds like there is a lack of maintainence going on there. why should the other taxpayers bail her out? this would be a dangerous precident set by the town. I have 1 son. when he was around 12, he decided to take showers which drained the tank. He is now 17 and drains the tank everyday…most days twice since he is an athlete.
The cost of most things have gone up. our water bill has gone up also. Sicilano should have taken the deal and walked away. it was very generous of the town to make that offer. but no, she went public. i am not letting go of this one..i am going to the town and imploring them not to give her a “deal”. to all the posters who thinks this town sucks….why do you live in a town that is so horrible? i think the services are awesome!

To number 12, the article says the tenant is her family, I doubt they would leave a facet running. A faucet running for 3 months straight I don’t think would go unnoticed. I think you made a lot of good points about the town and I agree! 12 years and not one single error, doesn’t sound statistically possible! And for 19, she said the meter is in the house, so an undergorund leak wouldn’t go through her meter. As for 20, she said she owns multiple properties, and I’m sure that was an exxageration about a million toilets. Gimme a break, a person couldn’t have millions, I think she was trying to make a point. And if you do the math, you could shower twice a day and “drain the tank” and you still wouldn’t get that water usage. And the plumber the Advocate talked to in the article said a running toilet would NOT run up that kind of bill. I think if you have a long history of a certain amount of water usage and then all of a sudden you get almost FIVE TIMES that usage (she said it was 200 last year), convieniently at the same time as a new meter, there is a problem. You have to look at trends and if she was a bad property owner like 20 claims then the trend would not be so out of whack for one billing period. I think people need be more careful about throwing stones and assuming peopole are wrong, what if she isn’t wrong and you go out of your way to persecute her? I don’t really think it is anyone’s place to do that. Its between her and the town adn this is the place to discuss it.
Sounds like the trend here is for the town to not take complaints seriously and to consistenly blame the property owners. Its too bad really. They should look into the meter more closely and help her figure out what went wrong instead of writing her off so quickly. It must have taken a lot to go to the paper, I’m sure it was as a result of the town’s inflexibility.

#21, The trend you talk about sounds correct, because of the inexperience of all these new transplants in the Town Hall, they seem to often either overreact or under react. When the town lost so many of our career professionals after the 2005 takeover, we lost much of the experience and compassion needed to serve the residents that you get over the years. It’s now more of an us-versus-them defensive posture, unless you contribute, just look at the 20/20 report.

I don’t live in Delmar I live in Jacksonville, Fl. We also have the same meters. We too had the same issues with the meters. (makes you wonder if we are paying for the new meters and for them to be installed) Our bills also were higher than normal and basically we got the same tale, or is that tail? I raised enough cane that they finally came out and replaced the meter and found that there was a problem with the meter. My dad says the squeaky wheel gets the grease, I squeaked enough this was done at no cost to me. If I were you I would insist they change the meter again at no cost to me and set up a payment plan. It’s really hard to fight the city but you can shove. In Jacksonville our bills are still high but they did get a little lower after the first bill or so. Maybe you to are paying for the installing and meter.
Good luck to you and the people of your town.
Becky

Why not put another meter on right before or after the existing meter and see if they record the same amount of water flow. If they do then I doubt that there would be two defective meters. Use two different types of meters. Perhaps one could be an old analog style that a human will have to read rather than relying on an electronic signal being sent. Compare the readings for several months and see if there is any significant difference. Just a thought.